The pyramid at dawn, the cenote at noon, the reef by three.
Which Chichen Itza day gets you through the gate before the coaches. What a cenote swim really costs. Whether Teotihuacan is worth doing from a balloon. Reviews of every tour you can book in Mexico.
01
02Four days that decide a Mexico itinerary.
A balloon over Teotihuacan, a Sunday on the Xochimilco canals, turtles off the Riviera Maya, and an evening of agave. What each costs, and what the people who took it say.
01First lightBalloon flight + pick up in CDMX + Breakfast in Cave + PyramidsBalloons lift off over the Teotihuacan valley at sunrise, with pick-up in Mexico City and breakfast in a cave. You are back before lunch.
02The city SundayXochimilco, Coyoacan and Frida Kahlo with Optional LunchPainted trajineras on the Xochimilco canals, then Coyoacan and the Frida Kahlo house. The Mexico City day people talk about afterwards.
03Turtles, then cold waterHalf-Day Sea Turtle and Cenote Snorkeling Tour from Cancun & Riviera MayaSnorkelling with green turtles, then a swim in a cenote. Half a day out of Cancun and the Riviera Maya, and the water is warm all year.
04Agave and tacosFood & Mixology Tour:Tequila,Tacos, Mezcal and Agave CocktailsTequila, mezcal, agave cocktails and the tacos built to go with them. Come hungry and keep the rest of the evening clear.
Mexico keeps its best water underground and offshore.
A cenote is a collapsed limestone roof over cold, clear groundwater, and there are thousands of them behind the Riviera Maya. Out front is the second longest barrier reef on earth. Three kinds of wet day, and what it costs to get in.
Six places worth building a Mexican week around.
A reef city on the Caribbean, the biggest capital in the Americas, a desert that runs into the sea at Cabo, cenote country behind Playa, ruins on a Tulum cliff and the mezcal valleys of Oaxaca. Six starting points, and the best day out in each.
Chichen Itza rewards whoever gets there first.
El Castillo is roped off and the plaza fills by ten, so the whole day turns on your departure time. The early runs out of Cancun, Playa and Valladolid reach the gate while the stone is still cool, and most of them fold in a cenote and lunch on the way back.
The days out more travellers take than any other in Mexico.
Every Mexican tour we have reviewed →Eight bookings that carry more travellers than anything else in the country, and what earns each of them the slot.
1
Chichen Itza, Cenote, and Valladolid Tour
Travel from Cancun, Playa del Carmen, Tulum, or Riviera Maya with a bilingual guide to Chichen Itza, Cenote Chichikan, and Valladolid. Guides such as Edwin, Cesar, Luis, and Hugo bring Mayan history to life. Expect a buffet lunch, optional hotel pickup, and a full 12 to 14 hours on the road.
From · $45
Read our review →
2
Chichen Itza, Cenote & Valladolid Tour with Tequila and Lunch
from $34
3
Teotihuacan, Guadalupe Shrine & Tlatelolco Day Tour with Lunch
from $39
4
Xochimilco, Coyoacan and Frida Kahlo with Optional Lunch
from $34
5
Mr. Sanchos Beach Club All-Inclusive Day Pass
from $79
6
Chichen Itza, Cenote & Valladolid Tour with Lunch
from $49
7
Early morning Chichen Itza Tour: Cenote and Tequila Tasting
from $26
8
Balloon flight + Breakfast in cave + Pyramids + Pick up CDMX.
from $172
Comal, cantina, agave field: Mexico eats and drinks in public.
Taco walks that run past midnight, cooking classes that start in the market at eight, and tastings that finally separate tequila from mezcal. Book the class early in the trip. You will cook it again at home.
What a day out in Mexico actually costs.
Every tour on the site, grouped by what it costs a head. A good share of the best Mexican days come in under the price of a resort dinner.
Museum entries, market walks, city walking tours and the short cenote runs out of Playa and Tulum.
The full-day standards: Chichen Itza with lunch, reef snorkels, catamaran days and the Teotihuacan run.
Sunrise balloon flights, private guides, whale charters and the once-a-trip splurges that earn it.
Three things that happen in Mexico and nowhere else.
Reefs and ruins turn up all around the Caribbean. Swimming inside a collapsed cave system, a masked wrestler off the top rope, and a painted barge crewed by a brass band do not.
The Cenotes
The Yucatan has no rivers. Rain drains straight through the limestone into a flooded cave network, and where a roof has fallen in you get a cenote: a shaft of cold, glass-clear water hung with tree roots and stalactites. The Maya treated them as doorways and dropped offerings into them. Some are open pools you walk into, some are caverns you climb down to by ladder, and the water sits at about 25C every day of the year.
- 1Chichen Itza, Cenote, and Valladolid Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 24,293 reviews
- 2Chichen Itza, Cenote & Valladolid Tour with Tequila and Lunch★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 15,789 reviews
- 3Early morning Chichen Itza Tour: Cenote and Tequila Tasting★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 6,657 reviews
Lucha Libre
Mexican wrestling is theatre with a rulebook: tecnicos against rudos, three-man teams, and a mask that a fighter can be forced to gamble. Arena Mexico in the capital runs on Tuesday, Friday and Sunday nights, the crowd shouts things you will be glad you did not understand, and the beer and tacos outside are half the evening. Cameras are usually fine; taking a mask off in the ring is not.
- 1Lucha Libre Tickets & Tacos & Beer & Mezcal – BEST NIGHT EVER!★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 1,077 reviews
- 2Lucha Libre Experience in Mexico City★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 595 reviews
- 3Lucha Libre Tour and Mezcal Tasting in Mexico City★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 519 reviews
The Xochimilco Trajineras
What is left of the Aztec canal system runs through the south of Mexico City, and you see it from a trajinera: a flat wooden barge painted in primary colours with a woman’s name arched over the bow. You hire one by the hour, it is poled along by one man, and smaller boats pull alongside selling elotes, micheladas and a mariachi set you pay for by the song.
- 1Xochimilco, Coyoacan and Frida Kahlo with Optional Lunch★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 7,320 reviews
- 2Xochimilco, Coyoacan, Frida Kahlo Museum & Murals Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 4.4 · 3,025 reviews
- 3Xochimilco Barco Fiesta Tentacion 18+ with Open Bar and Tacos★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 1,209 reviews
Four Mexican bookings that will not wait for you.
Most of this country can be arranged over breakfast for the same afternoon. These four run on sunrise slots, migration calendars and museum ticketing systems that take no interest in when your flight lands.
- 01Chichen Itza, Cenote, and Valladolid TourThe site closes mid-afternoon and the coach parties land late morning, so the early departures are the ones worth having, and they go first.
- 02Balloon flight + Breakfast in cave + Pyramids + Pick up CDMX.Balloons fly at sunrise or not at all, and a basket holds a fixed number. A wind cancellation gets rebooked into an already full week.
- 03La Paz Whale Shark Snorkeling Tour and Lunch From Los CabosThe migrations run to a calendar, not to yours: whale sharks off Isla Mujeres in summer, grey and humpback whales off Baja and Vallarta in winter.
- 04Xochimilco, Coyoacan and Frida Kahlo with Optional LunchThe Frida Kahlo house sells timed tickets online and regularly sells out days in advance. Turning up at the gate in Coyoacan does not work.
Yucatán rain arrives at four and stops for nobody.
From June the heat builds all morning and comes down as a thunderstorm in the late afternoon, and an open ruin is the worst place to be standing when it does. The answer is the same one the Maya used: go under something. Cave systems, cool museum halls, a kitchen, a market roof, a tasting room.
The other coast is colder, emptier and full of whales.
Baja California Sur runs cactus desert straight into the Sea of Cortez, and Puerto Vallarta hides waterfalls twenty minutes behind the beach. Grey and humpback whales come down between December and March, and the sunset sailings out of Cabo run past the arch on the way back.
Every Pacific and Baja day out →
By place — coast, capital and colonial towns
By kind of day — water, stone, kitchen or engine
Mexico City, then the Yucatán: the run almost everybody does first.
Teotihuacan
Chichen ItzaThe newest Mexican tour reviews.
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Isla Mujeres Catamaran Tour with Open Bar, Lunch and Snorkeling
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CATAMARAN to Isla Mujeres, Snorkel & Beach Club by Xcaret
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Catamaran Cancun to Isla mujeres Lunch OpenBar and Snorkeling
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All-Inclusive Isla Mujeres Catamaran with Free Transportation
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